


Incredibly Long Crosscountry Ride

by alright_petal



Series: One Direction AUs [1]
Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: AU, F/M, Harry Styles - Freeform, One Shot, RPF, Train Ride
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-02
Updated: 2016-01-02
Packaged: 2018-05-11 04:51:35
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,793
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5614609
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alright_petal/pseuds/alright_petal
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Oneshot set on an American train where a girl looking for certainties meets a curly boy and offers him a sandwich.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Incredibly Long Crosscountry Ride

It was a strange summer. Changes were in the air and the huge amount of decisions I had to take after college was a burden I wasn't sure I could bear completely – I needed some time to think. My planned life was over, no matter how long I had tried to procrastinate. I could not give up to the uncertain yet, though, so I decided to plan one last thing for myself. Again, decisions to be taken. But this was rather simple, since I had always had a soft spot for train rides. I bought a two months lasting ticket, carefully chose the cities I wanted to visit, packed my loyal backpack with strictly necessary belongings, _The Lord of the Rings_ book and my iPod and hopped on the first transcontinental Amtrak wagon that passed by the railway station.

The first days were hard. Being all alone in a train, abandoned to my thoughts and reflections, barely knowing what would come next once the vacation finished was not on top of my to-do list. But I soon learned to push any stressing thought in the back of my mind and just enjoy the amusing sight of the motley and constantly changing landscapes that flowed behind the window of my compartment, as I liked to define it. Every time I changed train, of course, the compartment changed as well – but to me, it was always the same. After all, I needed something as close to a home as possible.

During the first weeks I had been lucky enough to find empty staterooms, but after a few hours on the California Zephyr I had managed to catch in time in Chicago, someone walked in.

“I'm sorry to bother you, miss, but is this seat occupied?”

As I lifted my head from the book I was reading, slightly upset at the thought that I had to share the small place with another human being, I admit I was pleased to discover that the low, raspy voice belonged to a curly young man, probably in his early twenties.

“No, it's fine. Help yourself” I replied, gesturing him to take place in front of me.  
“Thank you very much” he said with a full smile. He had deep dimples and seemed kind.

I slid my sunglasses back on, but I couldn't keep reading – the new presence in the small place distracted me and since I like to stare at interesting people I inspected the man behind my dark shades, trying not to get caught.

He was looking outside the window, the warm upcoming sunset enlightening his face. He had long, wavy hair that almost reached his shoulders - brown locks half covered by a large black fedora that reminded me of James Bay. Everything in his face seemed softly sharp – yes, that's an oxymoron, but it is also the first expression that popped up in my mind at the sight of his features. From his tight jaw, to the perfectly straight line of his nose, to the long, dark eyebrows... everything looked carved out a piece of marble. He looked like one of those pale white statues that seem made of flesh but you know are cold and hard, but vice versa – you could tell he was soft as a pillow in spite of his geometric features.  
His eyes were partly hidden by his long eyelashes, but I guessed they were green. They matched his checked flannel shirt, whose top buttons were undone, revealing two bird-like tattoos on his chest and a few necklaces. His long, crossed legs were wrapped up in black skinny jeans, cut on both knees. Brown suede boots and a leather hold-all completed the indie-band-member look, that made me raise an eyebrow (I can't recall if it was in appreciation or sarcasm) before I got back to Frodo's troubles.

We stayed silent for a while. The hours passed, and the view outside the dirty glass changed. As the light dimmed with scarlet shades, the environment seemed to go along and the first orange rocky valleys started to appear.  
It was around eight o’clock when we got to the canyon and my stomach started to grumble. I forced myself to grab a sandwich I had made that morning before taking the train – I had always felt uncomfortable eating in front of other people, but the stranger in front of me didn’t look like he would judge me. As I carefully unwrapped my dinner, I caught his nostrils vibrating at the delicious smell of mozzarella and raw ham.  
“Do you want a piece?” I found myself asking. Was I insane? Sharing food with a stranger? That surely wasn’t something my usual self would do, but the situation was already weird enough to allow such a surprising gesture.  
The boy looked straight at me, a cute smile on his face.  
“No, thank you. It’s yours, you should it eat”  
I raised my eyebrows as I heard a familiar, rumbling sound coming from under his shirt. He blushed and silently accepted the chunk of bread I was handing him out.  
“Are you sure…?” he asked, before biting it.  
“Don’t worry, I have another one” I lied.  
We ate in silence, enjoying the meal. Once we were both finished, he suddenly spoke up.  
“That was very good, thank you”  
“You’re welcome. Where are you headed?” I asked, surprising myself once again.  
“Austin, Texas. Family reunion” the boy replied, stopping for a few seconds to munch on the sandwich. “You?”  
I laughed, shaking my head. “I wish I knew”  
The boy made a funny face, sweeping a few crumbles off his shirt.  
“No, okay, I’m just on a trip across the States”  
“Sounds fun. Are you alone?”  
“Are you gonna stalk and kill me if I say yes?” I asked, a hint of humor in my voice. Even if we had exchanged just a few words, I could feel in my guts that he would have never hurt me.  
“I’m too lazy for that – and you offered me your food. I could never betray you like that” he replied, his pink lips parting in a smile. “My name’s Harry”  
I shook his large hand, the cold steel of his rings pressing on my hot skin.  
“Nora. Nice to meet you”.

We went on talking as the sky above us turned deep blue, the first shining stars glistening in the upcoming darkness. The moon couldn’t be seen from our windows, but the absence of artificial lights outside allowed its white rays to seep through the slightly dirty glass of our wagon.  
We had both chosen not to pay for a night bunk, so we soon had to shift into the sticky leather of our seats and adjust ourselves for a decent sleep.  
We said goodnight to each other and turned the main light off, but after a few minutes of silence, right once I had started slowly drifting into a dream, Harry’s voice echoed in the compartment.

“Where would you like to be?”  
I flickered my eyelids open and turned towards him.  
“What do you mean?”  
“When I asked you where you are headed you said that you don’t know it, so I want to know where you’d like to be”.  
In the dim light I caught a glimpse of his lanky silhouette – he was on his side, turned towards me, his curls falling from the leather seat he was laying on.  
I stared at the ceiling and thought about his question.  
“I’d like to be somewhere that feels like home, somewhere stable where I can always come back to without worrying about what to do next”.  
He didn’t reply soon and my words lingered in the warm, dusty air of the compartment.  
“Well” Harry finally said, “what if your somewhere wasn’t a place but a person?”  
I reflected about it, but I couldn’t find a response for that. How can a person feel like home, or like a place? I couldn’t wrap my head around it.  
“I guess it will never happen” I replied after a while, but the soft snoring coming from the other side of the cabin told me Harry had fallen asleep.

* * *

 

Harry and I spent 5 weeks together on that train. I suppose we passed Texas more than once, but he didn’t mention it nor when he was due to his “family reunion”. We visited different cities and every time it seemed like he knew them better than a local guide. He brought me to hidden restaurants and definitely not touristic museums. I saw him tie up his chocolate-y hair up in a bun at least a thousand times. I glimpsed inside his bag once to find out pieces of clothing that probably costed more than my future college tuition. We bathed in rivers and tanned in parks, breathing and living the United States. I got to know his favorite books and music and films, but never a thing about his past or his present, not to mention his future plans. It seemed like I had met him a lifetime before but without actually knowing anything about him.

Harry was a living puzzle and that summer I tried hard to solve him. But the end of August arrived, and with it my final ride before my ticket validity expired, and still he was a mystery.  
“I’m leaving on the next stop” I found myself finally saying. It was a Tuesday and it was incredibly hot. We were sitting side by side in an empty compartment, our sticky and sweaty arms brushing one against the other.  
“I know” he whispered, looking out of the window.  
“I’ll miss you, Harry” I blurted out. “Can we keep in touch or something?”  
He turned his emerald eyes towards me, a smile painted on his angelic, sharp face. “Have you found your somewhere?”  
I frowned, but suddenly our first conversation came back to my mind.  
“I-I don’t know… I guess it’s home. Where I’m going back now”  
“Fine” Harry replied, his gaze lost once again outside. “The you don’t need me anymore”.  
I opened my mouth to reply to that nonsense, but the speaker interrupted us announcing we were arrived to my station.  
A second before the doors opened, Harry turned around and hugged me – his whole body was pulsing on mine, all those days we had spent together vibrating in our limbs.  
“I’ll see you soon” he murmured in my hear, and then I had to go.

As I put my feet on the concrete of the train station, I realized I hadn’t got home – I had just left it. Was I sad? Not that much. Because my somewhere was a person, and that person was Harry. And I knew this wasn’t the last of him, nor the last of us.


End file.
